Into the West, 1860–1880
The Missouri River led explorers, trappers, and migrants into the American West. From the 1820s on, the river was the starting point for tens of thousands of people looking for new lives along the California, Mormon, Oregon, and Santa Fe trails.
Many travelers on the Missouri encountered the Hidatsa and Mandan peoples, who lived in villages along the river. They grew corn, beans, and tobacco and used the river for trade and travel. In the late 1840s, the town of Mua-iduskupe-hises, a Mandan term that means “like a fishhook,” had more residents than any nearby white settlement.
Buffalo Bird Woman gathering wood by boat
Gathering wood for fuel was important work for Mandan and Hidatsa women. The hours spent paddling bullboats along the shorelines made them expert boat handlers. When steamboats arrived on the Missouri, the women began selling wood to the vessels. Buffalo Bird Woman noted that “Near Like-a-Fishhook village, wood was rather scarce because we sold so much of it to steam-boats.”
Encampment of the Travellers on the Missouri
Swiss artist Karl Bodmer was part of an expedition on the Missouri River from 1832 to 1834. His sketches and paintings recorded views of the people, watercraft, and landscapes along the river.
Reproduction of engraving by Karl Bodmer
Courtesy of Smithsonian Institution Libraries
Bullboat, 1860
Native peoples along the upper Missouri made small boats like this to travel along the shoreline, carrying wood and other supplies. Formed by stretching animal hides over a supple wood frame, bullboats were typically made by women. French, British, and American fur traders also used bullboats to bring their furs down the Missouri.
Lent by the National Museum of Natural History
Stern-wheel steamboat Far West
Built at Pittsburgh, 1870
The Far West
The U.S. Army chartered steamboats to supply outposts in Montana and the Dakota Territory during its Indian campaigns. In the summer of 1876, the Far West covered 700 miles of the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers in only 54 hours. It bore the news of the Sioux and Cheyenne victory over Gen. George Custer’s cavalry at the Battle of the Little Big Horn.
The two tall spars at the front of the boat could be lowered into the river bottom and, with the aid of the capstan and engine power, lift the vessel over shallow areas or obstructions, a bit or “hop” at a time. This practice was called “grasshoppering.”
